Plans for a £12m new housing development adjacent to the Redhall estate in Darlington have been submitted by Keepmoat Homes, as part of NHS England’s Healthy New Towns programme.
It was announced last year that NHS England had selected a handful of new major housing projects across the UK where joint working between health agencies and developer’s was to be encouraged to ensure that the proposed new neighbourhood would incorporate health planning and well-being into the delivery of new homes.
A bid by Darlington Borough Council, Darlington CCG and County Durham and Darlington NHS Foundation Trust involving Keepmoat Homes was one of ten successful bids out of 114 applicants. The focus of the approved project is the eastern growth area of Darlington as the eastern side of the town has significantly higher premature mortality rates; higher levels of worklessness; emergency hospital admissions and an ageing population that wants to stay near their community.
Keepmoat Home’s recent planning application is for 81 two and three bedroom houses all of which will be built to the Lifetime Homes Standard and will incorporate a range of innovative new technologies aimed to assist residents to lead a healthier life with better connectivity to health support.
The development links to key initiatives being delivered by the local authority in the area such as cycle ways, trim tracks, access to transport links and linkages to the schools. Ian Prescott, Land and Partnership’s Director for Keepmoat Homes, said: “We’ve been working with the Council to deliver an innovative new approach to housing delivery in Darlington and were part of the bidding process – so we’re delighted to have got plans submitted for consideration.
“These new homes perfectly complement the work of the Darlington health and care organisations’ Transformation Programme (Vision 2020). We have experience in the delivery of housing to Lifetime Homes Standards and we have a recognised track record in catering for older people or those with specialist care needs; so we know this will be a strong partnership that will deliver for the people of Darlington.”
Miriam Davidson, Programme Lead for Healthy New Towns, said: “This proposal by Keepmoat is a key development in the Healthy New Towns project for Darlington, which has made great progress since its introduction last year. We hope that this will be an exemplar development and demonstration project that embraces the Darlington Healthy New Towns design principles, which we have recently developed.
“We’re holding a Healthy New Towns stakeholder event on Friday (30 June), where Keepmoat Homes as a key partner will be explaining how they have been working to incorporate ‘healthy design’ into their proposals.”
If Keepmoat Homes is granted planning permission, the firm is looking to start work on the development in December this year.
For more information regarding Keepmoat, please visit Keepmoat.com.